Grouse Hunting Through My Wife's Eyes
Read the rest after the link
Showing posts with label hunting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hunting. Show all posts
Monday, September 23, 2013
Guest post over on R-Dub Outdoors!
Thought you might all want to check out a guest post I wrote for the mister's blog, about grouse hunting these past 6 years.
Rory and I met online back in 2008. Our first date was at a Starbucks,
where I proceeded to shock him by ordering hot chocolate on a 100 degree
day. I'm not sure if that is what prompted him to follow up and ask for
a second date (a hike up nearby 'mountain' looking for Shorthorned
Lizards), and then a third (another hike on another very hot day), but
whatever the reason, a bit over a month later I found myself out hunting
for basically the first time of my life.
Read the rest after the link
Read the rest after the link
Thursday, October 18, 2012
Deer Hunting
This year my husband managed to get his deer on opening morning, which at the time I thought was just great! However, what it has meant is that the whole rest of the week of hunting season he could focus on getting me into situations where I could try to shoot my deer. Sigh. I haven't gotten one yet, although I had a shot at one earlier in the week (I missed) and we saw a couple more legal bucks moving just onto private property last night.
At this point, we've still got one or two opportunities to try to get me one, fitted around work and duck hunting commitments before the season ends on Sunday, but I'm feeling pretty worn out right now so I'm not sure how much more hiking around I can take! Add in dragging the deer back home or to the vehicle, and the processing of the meat, and I'm starting to doubt my ability to make it through what shooting one would entail! Of course, getting my first deer (ever) would be a big deal, so I'll keep trying I'm sure :)
Also, we typically run out of deer meat before the following hunting season, so realistically we need meat from more than one deer to supply our red meat needs. We'll see what tonight & the weekend brings, and I'll let you know how it turns out!
At this point, we've still got one or two opportunities to try to get me one, fitted around work and duck hunting commitments before the season ends on Sunday, but I'm feeling pretty worn out right now so I'm not sure how much more hiking around I can take! Add in dragging the deer back home or to the vehicle, and the processing of the meat, and I'm starting to doubt my ability to make it through what shooting one would entail! Of course, getting my first deer (ever) would be a big deal, so I'll keep trying I'm sure :)
Also, we typically run out of deer meat before the following hunting season, so realistically we need meat from more than one deer to supply our red meat needs. We'll see what tonight & the weekend brings, and I'll let you know how it turns out!
Monday, November 14, 2011
On Cougars.
About 2 weeks ago, the day after our friends B & K left after being here a week and a half, and the day before my best friend A was due to arrive for a bit over a week, my husband filled his cougar tag. It sounds more exciting than it was (for us at least!). The local game agent, who my husband knows fairly well through work, called my husband to say he had just shot a problem cougar, did my husband want it to fill his tag? My husband, always eager for more skulls (yup, I married the right guy!), eagerly said YES! Before really telling me what was going on (on our one night to ourselves in the midst of a month of madness mind you!), he was on the phone with a close friend who lives nearby. My husband convinced K (and his wife and their son who is the same age as Little M) to bring the whole family over so the guys could process the cougar while the girls played with the kiddos.
Sigh. I love, absolutely love, hanging out with them, but really? Our one night off? Sigh. Of course, and as usual, us girls had a great time chatting and hanging out with the kids inside (and briefly outside watching the game agent tell the guys how to go about skinning the cat, before the kids got too cold). And the guys were quite successful in skinning the cougar and cutting the backstraps off to put in our freezers (apparently cougar backstrap tastes like pork - who knew!). All told, it was a good night, although not the night I had envisioned.
So the story with the cougar is this. It had been hanging around a lady's house for a couple days, she had kids and livestock around and when the game agents went to check out the cougar it approached them, so obviously fairly acclimated to humans. There wasn't a good spot to put the normal livetrap, and leaving the cougar there just wasn't a safe option, so the game agent had to shoot it. Knowing that my husband wanted a cougar skull, the game agent gave us a call, and that was that!
Now, on to the more recent and personally more exciting cougar story. On friday, my husband and I (and Little M and the dogs of course) were on a ramble around our property and wandered back through the field next door. I had been seeing crows, ravens, and magpies flitting around and was wondering if there was a deer dead in there or something. We came across a spot where there was a lot of blood and the stomach contents of an animal, presumably a deer, but no other sign. It seemed strange, but after some searching around the area didn't reveal anything further, we shrugged and walked back home.
Fast forward to last night. I had just put Little M down to bed, and one of the dogs started barking from the sun porch. I went out to see what Lily was barking at, stepping over a sleeping Tia to do so. I figured there mustn't be much happening if Tia was sleeping through it, then realized I was hearing noises outside. I told Lily she was ok and stuck my head out the patio door. My first thought was, that sounds like a cat. Then I heard deer thumping away as they moved through the field next door, and thought, oh, it must just be deer mating or something. Then I heard a brief strange bleating sound. Again, I thought, oh, I guess that is what deer mating sounds like, there is no way there is really a cat next door.
I let Lily out, keeping a close eye on her in the floodlights, and called my husband, who was at work. He had talked to the game agent earlier, who had told him that blood sign like we saw in the field is often a sign that a mother cougar and her kits are in the area. They kill a deer and the blood and stomach contents is all that is remaining after they eat their fill and carry off the rest of the carcass to munch on later. Hmm, I thought, as I urgently called Lily to come a bit closer to the deck. But I thought, no, there is no way there is really a cougar in the field next door.
Fast forward to this morning. I had to be in at work early for a day that I also have to take Little M to daycare. The house was still shaded by the hills to the east when we left, and imagine my surprise to see the head, just the head, of a young deer on the road as I drove down the road to daycare, right as I passed that field next door. Hmmm, I thought to myself, as I started to laugh. I guess those weren't deer mating last night. My next thought was, COOL - I heard a cougar kill a deer last night!
After talking with E, the lady who watches Little M a couple days a week, I called my husband and convinced him to check under the back deck for cougars before letting the dogs out, and to maybe call the game agent again and to check the head out on the road on his way in to work. The game agent said to look for the nose of the deer being chewed off, as that is fairly characteristic of cougar kills, and sure enough, the deer head had the nose chewed off.
The game agent should be bringing a trap by in the next couple days to see if he can trap the cougar (and her kits if it is a mom), and hopefully he will be able to collar her and ID chip her kits and then release them back here. We certainly aren't minding having a cougar nearby, although it does make me more cautious with the dogs after dark, and more mindful of my back when I go out to get wood in the evenings! I would really not be very happy if the cougar had to be shot because I was careless with our animals, that is for sure. Hopefully we will get some pictures from a nice safe distance, and then the cougar will move off and live a happy life up in the high country eating lots of tasty deer :)
Sigh. I love, absolutely love, hanging out with them, but really? Our one night off? Sigh. Of course, and as usual, us girls had a great time chatting and hanging out with the kids inside (and briefly outside watching the game agent tell the guys how to go about skinning the cat, before the kids got too cold). And the guys were quite successful in skinning the cougar and cutting the backstraps off to put in our freezers (apparently cougar backstrap tastes like pork - who knew!). All told, it was a good night, although not the night I had envisioned.
So the story with the cougar is this. It had been hanging around a lady's house for a couple days, she had kids and livestock around and when the game agents went to check out the cougar it approached them, so obviously fairly acclimated to humans. There wasn't a good spot to put the normal livetrap, and leaving the cougar there just wasn't a safe option, so the game agent had to shoot it. Knowing that my husband wanted a cougar skull, the game agent gave us a call, and that was that!
Now, on to the more recent and personally more exciting cougar story. On friday, my husband and I (and Little M and the dogs of course) were on a ramble around our property and wandered back through the field next door. I had been seeing crows, ravens, and magpies flitting around and was wondering if there was a deer dead in there or something. We came across a spot where there was a lot of blood and the stomach contents of an animal, presumably a deer, but no other sign. It seemed strange, but after some searching around the area didn't reveal anything further, we shrugged and walked back home.
Fast forward to last night. I had just put Little M down to bed, and one of the dogs started barking from the sun porch. I went out to see what Lily was barking at, stepping over a sleeping Tia to do so. I figured there mustn't be much happening if Tia was sleeping through it, then realized I was hearing noises outside. I told Lily she was ok and stuck my head out the patio door. My first thought was, that sounds like a cat. Then I heard deer thumping away as they moved through the field next door, and thought, oh, it must just be deer mating or something. Then I heard a brief strange bleating sound. Again, I thought, oh, I guess that is what deer mating sounds like, there is no way there is really a cat next door.
I let Lily out, keeping a close eye on her in the floodlights, and called my husband, who was at work. He had talked to the game agent earlier, who had told him that blood sign like we saw in the field is often a sign that a mother cougar and her kits are in the area. They kill a deer and the blood and stomach contents is all that is remaining after they eat their fill and carry off the rest of the carcass to munch on later. Hmm, I thought, as I urgently called Lily to come a bit closer to the deck. But I thought, no, there is no way there is really a cougar in the field next door.
Fast forward to this morning. I had to be in at work early for a day that I also have to take Little M to daycare. The house was still shaded by the hills to the east when we left, and imagine my surprise to see the head, just the head, of a young deer on the road as I drove down the road to daycare, right as I passed that field next door. Hmmm, I thought to myself, as I started to laugh. I guess those weren't deer mating last night. My next thought was, COOL - I heard a cougar kill a deer last night!
After talking with E, the lady who watches Little M a couple days a week, I called my husband and convinced him to check under the back deck for cougars before letting the dogs out, and to maybe call the game agent again and to check the head out on the road on his way in to work. The game agent said to look for the nose of the deer being chewed off, as that is fairly characteristic of cougar kills, and sure enough, the deer head had the nose chewed off.
The game agent should be bringing a trap by in the next couple days to see if he can trap the cougar (and her kits if it is a mom), and hopefully he will be able to collar her and ID chip her kits and then release them back here. We certainly aren't minding having a cougar nearby, although it does make me more cautious with the dogs after dark, and more mindful of my back when I go out to get wood in the evenings! I would really not be very happy if the cougar had to be shot because I was careless with our animals, that is for sure. Hopefully we will get some pictures from a nice safe distance, and then the cougar will move off and live a happy life up in the high country eating lots of tasty deer :)
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Fall hunting pictures
So it has been a busy few weeks here. We've had old school & academy friends of my husband's visit for their yearly vacation up here duck hunting, we've had old school friends of mine visit, my husband shot a deer and tagged a cougar that the game agents had to put down, I had a construction project at work that I had to be on-site observing once or twice a day to help out the project manager while he was off at training for a week, and we had a crazy few days with our rental house. It made for a busy end to October and start to November!
But here I am, determined to get back to regular posting :) I thought I would start by sharing some of the pictures we've taken over the last month. These ones are mostly from duck camp with family & friends.
Dirty camping girl.
Sagebrush sunset.
Little M in the sagebrush.
Mama & pyjama girl by the campfire.
Camo girl.
Dried grass & grey morning skies.
Rainbow cows.
The floppy eared cow.
Sandhill cranes in a field.
Hunter in the distance lost in the grass.
Pretty blue & grass.
The guys sneaking up on a jump hole up on top.
Remi eagerly retrieving a male mallard duck.
Mama & Little M watching the puppy.
Lily practicing her duck retrieval skills.
Fall colors, out-west style.
Pretty sunset.
Hanging out with Grampa in the morning in her pyjama's.
The cliff lakes
That's all for now, hope you liked them!
But here I am, determined to get back to regular posting :) I thought I would start by sharing some of the pictures we've taken over the last month. These ones are mostly from duck camp with family & friends.
That's all for now, hope you liked them!
Thursday, October 20, 2011
Fall camping & quail hunting
So before I forget in the chaos that is duck hunting season (and deer - my husband got his buck this morning! yay!), I really need to share how our first 2011 quail hunting trip went! We typically go across to duck camp the first weekend in October, or shortly after that first weekend depending on what shifts my husband is working. This year was no different, we went late in the week the week after quail hunting opened, and just for one night.
Our purpose in going across to duck camp before duck hunting opens is twofold. One, we set up camp before the rest of the family descends for duck hunting on opening weekend for duck & geese later in the month, and two, we get to quail hunt! I really enjoy going across that first weekend, it gets me back in the camping & hunting swing of things, and I get to relax and enjoy family time with just my husband and Little M (and our pack of dogs of course!) before the rest of his family comes and the camp gets really busy and crazy with many family members, kids, dogs, campers, tents, etc, etc!
Our camping weekend this year was shorter than some, since we are currently working completely different days. While I am easily able to take days off, I was saving time for later in the month (now!) when our friends are visiting to deer & duck hunt, so I just took the friday off. We went across on the Thursday, and the excitement started even before we got all of the way in the dirt road into camp.
It was getting near dark, but still within shooting hours, and as we drove up beside long lake, suddenly my husband slammed the brakes on the truck. I wasn't really paying attention to the road, I was still trying to peer down at the lake and see where the ducks were and how many there were. I realized that there was only one reason we would be stopped THAT quickly, and tried to figure out where he had seen them. The quail, that is!
He hopped out and loaded his shotgun up. I said I would wait this one out, so I went back to lower the tailgate and keep the dogs quiet while he hunted (we release them after the shooting if we are close to the truck). He started walking up the hill beside the road, and all of a sudden quail just started getting up everywhere! He got a couple shots off, and then I decided that I needed in on the action too. If I could get a bird down, it would be my first quail ever!
My husband encouraged me to hurry up as I carefully loaded shells into my gun (borrowed these last 3 falls from his little sister who is off at college in Hawaii). I looked around for quail, but didn't see any. We snuck along the hillside, and some more got up in front of us. I didn't get a shot off, still being too slow and hesitant for these fast flying quail, but he pointed one out that had perched on a big rock partway up the slope. I took aim and pulled the trigger. Nothing. Oops! Better take that safety off. Again, sighted down the barrel to the little quail sitting looking around on the rock. Bang!
And the quail fell down into the srubs and grass below. My husband moved off and got one of his own, and chased the quail for a bit, while I went back and got the two Griffons out of their crates in the back of the truck. Lily, my hunting dog, came with me while Remi headed after my husband.
Lily and I moved in to where I shot my bird. Lily sniffed around, and around, and around, and finally found my bird. I had to act quickly, because once she found it she got it into her mouth, and it was such a small little bird that it just started getting gulped back into her throat! Silly girl, so I grabbed a leg that was sticking out near her teeth and told her to give it, and pulled it out.
My first quail! My husband retrieved his from Remi and we loaded back into the truck to get in to camp and set up camp before it got completely dark.
The next morning we got up and took our time getting ready to head back out and do the rounds looking for more quail. We had several spots where we were going to park the truck and do short hikes around in the fields to look for quail and hungarian partridge. We saw lots of other wildlife - a coyote on the side of the road, hawks migrating through, flocks of sandhill cranes, V's of Canada geese, and assorted duck species, but no quail.
Finally we saw a quail on the edge of the road! We parked the truck and hopped out. We got out into the field, and my husband started moving towards where he had spotted the quail, standing on the lookout beside a large thicket of wild rose bushes. All of a sudden, quail just started pelting out of the thicket, one after another! I got off several shots, but they were at a bad angle moving from right to left in front of me, so I wasn't able to compensate for their speed. I was getting a bit frustrated as I could see my husband dropping bird after bird.
Then a couple got up out of the thicket and flew pretty much straight away from me. Ahah! I shot, and one fell! My first quail out of the air! Hurray! Pretty soon after that there were no more birds in the thicket to scare, so we got the dogs out of the truck and started moving around with them to retrieve the birds we had shot. All told that day we got 10 quail! Not bad for a day's hunting :)
We're off again this weekend to duck camp, and after last weekend (duck opening weekend) where I shot my first duck in the air, I'm eager to keep practicing my shooting skills. With our friends here who love a good sneak in to hard to access jump holes as much as we do, hopefully I will have more chances to get up close and personal with some ducks! Have a great weekend everyone!
Our purpose in going across to duck camp before duck hunting opens is twofold. One, we set up camp before the rest of the family descends for duck hunting on opening weekend for duck & geese later in the month, and two, we get to quail hunt! I really enjoy going across that first weekend, it gets me back in the camping & hunting swing of things, and I get to relax and enjoy family time with just my husband and Little M (and our pack of dogs of course!) before the rest of his family comes and the camp gets really busy and crazy with many family members, kids, dogs, campers, tents, etc, etc!
Our camping weekend this year was shorter than some, since we are currently working completely different days. While I am easily able to take days off, I was saving time for later in the month (now!) when our friends are visiting to deer & duck hunt, so I just took the friday off. We went across on the Thursday, and the excitement started even before we got all of the way in the dirt road into camp.
It was getting near dark, but still within shooting hours, and as we drove up beside long lake, suddenly my husband slammed the brakes on the truck. I wasn't really paying attention to the road, I was still trying to peer down at the lake and see where the ducks were and how many there were. I realized that there was only one reason we would be stopped THAT quickly, and tried to figure out where he had seen them. The quail, that is!
He hopped out and loaded his shotgun up. I said I would wait this one out, so I went back to lower the tailgate and keep the dogs quiet while he hunted (we release them after the shooting if we are close to the truck). He started walking up the hill beside the road, and all of a sudden quail just started getting up everywhere! He got a couple shots off, and then I decided that I needed in on the action too. If I could get a bird down, it would be my first quail ever!
My husband encouraged me to hurry up as I carefully loaded shells into my gun (borrowed these last 3 falls from his little sister who is off at college in Hawaii). I looked around for quail, but didn't see any. We snuck along the hillside, and some more got up in front of us. I didn't get a shot off, still being too slow and hesitant for these fast flying quail, but he pointed one out that had perched on a big rock partway up the slope. I took aim and pulled the trigger. Nothing. Oops! Better take that safety off. Again, sighted down the barrel to the little quail sitting looking around on the rock. Bang!
And the quail fell down into the srubs and grass below. My husband moved off and got one of his own, and chased the quail for a bit, while I went back and got the two Griffons out of their crates in the back of the truck. Lily, my hunting dog, came with me while Remi headed after my husband.
Lily and I moved in to where I shot my bird. Lily sniffed around, and around, and around, and finally found my bird. I had to act quickly, because once she found it she got it into her mouth, and it was such a small little bird that it just started getting gulped back into her throat! Silly girl, so I grabbed a leg that was sticking out near her teeth and told her to give it, and pulled it out.
My first quail! My husband retrieved his from Remi and we loaded back into the truck to get in to camp and set up camp before it got completely dark.
The next morning we got up and took our time getting ready to head back out and do the rounds looking for more quail. We had several spots where we were going to park the truck and do short hikes around in the fields to look for quail and hungarian partridge. We saw lots of other wildlife - a coyote on the side of the road, hawks migrating through, flocks of sandhill cranes, V's of Canada geese, and assorted duck species, but no quail.
Finally we saw a quail on the edge of the road! We parked the truck and hopped out. We got out into the field, and my husband started moving towards where he had spotted the quail, standing on the lookout beside a large thicket of wild rose bushes. All of a sudden, quail just started pelting out of the thicket, one after another! I got off several shots, but they were at a bad angle moving from right to left in front of me, so I wasn't able to compensate for their speed. I was getting a bit frustrated as I could see my husband dropping bird after bird.
Then a couple got up out of the thicket and flew pretty much straight away from me. Ahah! I shot, and one fell! My first quail out of the air! Hurray! Pretty soon after that there were no more birds in the thicket to scare, so we got the dogs out of the truck and started moving around with them to retrieve the birds we had shot. All told that day we got 10 quail! Not bad for a day's hunting :)
We're off again this weekend to duck camp, and after last weekend (duck opening weekend) where I shot my first duck in the air, I'm eager to keep practicing my shooting skills. With our friends here who love a good sneak in to hard to access jump holes as much as we do, hopefully I will have more chances to get up close and personal with some ducks! Have a great weekend everyone!
Saturday, September 3, 2011
Grouse Hunting
I'm joining up to the Preparedness Challenge that Amy at Homestead Revival has been hosting on Saturdays for months now. I've joined up once or twice in the past, but really just haven't been doing much on a weekly basis to get better prepared. I've been meaning to, but just haven't made the time or money for it... Something I've been knowing I should remedy, but just haven't. Luckily our lifestyle makes us more prepared than a lot of people, but still no excuse to not be really really prepared!
This week grouse hunting season opened in our area, and since my husband is really into bird hunting we've been out multiple times, driving the backroads and jumping into creek beds at the slightest hint of grouse, hiking closed roads, trails, and promising ridgelines, and overall just spending a lot of time outside in the wilderness. Before we headed out the first morning, I went through the pack that currently has most of our go-bag-type items, made sure I knew what was in it, and shifted some things to the pack one of us would be carrying with us as we hunted. The main pack would stay in the vehicle, and have some of the larger items - crank operated radio, water purification tablets, a headlamp, energy bars, a big water bottle, etc. In the smaller hydration pack I put things that would be important to keep us going while we were out hunting, or get us back to the vehicle if something happened - compass, whistle, knife, some extra food, another headlamp, small water bottle, Little M's sippy cup, that sort of thing. Whoever isn't carrying Little M on their back carries the hydration pack.
I felt pretty good about what we had with us, and definitely more prepared than in years past. But as I haven't yet gotten around to actually putting together designated go bags for each of us, let alone vehicle kits, I knew I didn't have everything we might need, although I wouldn't have predicted the item that we ended up needing!
Yes, both back tires were off the ground and spinning freely, the jeep was caught up on the back right bumper after we cut the corner of this whoopdedo (what the forest service around here uses to try to close roads off from the public) a bit tighter than we should have... Of course we were able to made do with what we had, which was a simple jack like you would use to change a tire, but having a high lift jack would have gotten the back end rotated around and us back on the road a lot quicker (in my husband's more knowledgeable opinion - I've never really gotten badly stuck in the woods before). We do have a high lift jack, and at times it has been in one of the trucks, but I've never seen it in the jeep that is our main grouse hunting rig, and with only one, I suspect it would always be in the vehicle that was sitting back in the driveway at home... I guess I'll have to put a high lift jack on the vehicle kit lists! There really isn't anything like actually being there & surviving to realize what you really need!
The other preparedness thing that we have been doing this past week is working on our hunting skills. The daily limit on grouse is 4 per person. Opening day I shot 2 grouse and my husband shot 1, and the second day we each shot 4. Not bad shooting I would say! In a survival situation, it is reasurring to know that we could provide meat for our family (providing we had something to shoot with and were in an area where wild game was present of course!).
Not only were we working on our shooting skills, we were working on our dogs skills - we have 2 wire haired pointing griffons - bird dogs - and we've been honing their bird scenting and retrieving skills. It doesn't do any good to be a great shot if you can't find any birds to begin with, or if the bird falls into a thicket when it falls and you can't find it - so our dogs have been doing really well for us!
This week grouse hunting season opened in our area, and since my husband is really into bird hunting we've been out multiple times, driving the backroads and jumping into creek beds at the slightest hint of grouse, hiking closed roads, trails, and promising ridgelines, and overall just spending a lot of time outside in the wilderness. Before we headed out the first morning, I went through the pack that currently has most of our go-bag-type items, made sure I knew what was in it, and shifted some things to the pack one of us would be carrying with us as we hunted. The main pack would stay in the vehicle, and have some of the larger items - crank operated radio, water purification tablets, a headlamp, energy bars, a big water bottle, etc. In the smaller hydration pack I put things that would be important to keep us going while we were out hunting, or get us back to the vehicle if something happened - compass, whistle, knife, some extra food, another headlamp, small water bottle, Little M's sippy cup, that sort of thing. Whoever isn't carrying Little M on their back carries the hydration pack.
I felt pretty good about what we had with us, and definitely more prepared than in years past. But as I haven't yet gotten around to actually putting together designated go bags for each of us, let alone vehicle kits, I knew I didn't have everything we might need, although I wouldn't have predicted the item that we ended up needing!
Yes, both back tires were off the ground and spinning freely, the jeep was caught up on the back right bumper after we cut the corner of this whoopdedo (what the forest service around here uses to try to close roads off from the public) a bit tighter than we should have... Of course we were able to made do with what we had, which was a simple jack like you would use to change a tire, but having a high lift jack would have gotten the back end rotated around and us back on the road a lot quicker (in my husband's more knowledgeable opinion - I've never really gotten badly stuck in the woods before). We do have a high lift jack, and at times it has been in one of the trucks, but I've never seen it in the jeep that is our main grouse hunting rig, and with only one, I suspect it would always be in the vehicle that was sitting back in the driveway at home... I guess I'll have to put a high lift jack on the vehicle kit lists! There really isn't anything like actually being there & surviving to realize what you really need!
The other preparedness thing that we have been doing this past week is working on our hunting skills. The daily limit on grouse is 4 per person. Opening day I shot 2 grouse and my husband shot 1, and the second day we each shot 4. Not bad shooting I would say! In a survival situation, it is reasurring to know that we could provide meat for our family (providing we had something to shoot with and were in an area where wild game was present of course!).
Not only were we working on our shooting skills, we were working on our dogs skills - we have 2 wire haired pointing griffons - bird dogs - and we've been honing their bird scenting and retrieving skills. It doesn't do any good to be a great shot if you can't find any birds to begin with, or if the bird falls into a thicket when it falls and you can't find it - so our dogs have been doing really well for us!
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